Field of the Invention
Embodiments described herein generally relate to a substrate carrier having an electrostatic chuck disposed therein configured for transporting and securing substrates. More specifically, embodiments described herein relate to a wafer carrier for smaller wafers and wafer pieces.
Description of the Related Art
Semiconductor processing equipment is generally engineered for performing processes on a single size substrate. A robot blade repeatedly transfers a carrier with a substrate disposed thereon into and out of a processing chamber. The carrier and robot blade are specifically sized to accommodate a single size substrate to improve substrate transferring characteristics and prevent damage to the substrates during transfer and positioning within the chamber. However, certain technologies that have been developed at larger substrate sizes do not exist at smaller substrate sizes. Additionally, increasingly thinner substrates having thicknesses as low as 100 μm are being utilized in microelectronics manufacturing. Thus, it may be difficult to perform certain processes on small or thin substrates because processing equipment is not available and engineered to accommodate a small or thin substrate. In addition, processing pieces or portions of a substrate may be advantageous during product development or process tuning, however, current transfer equipment and techniques are generally unable to adequately transfer substrate pieces.
Therefore, there is a need in the art for an improved substrate carrier for transferring substrates of various sizes and thicknesses.